Liz looks Around (A real Baja Gal)
Liz Beatty took a very circuitous route in finding the place of her dreams on the beach in La Salina. In 1967 she read, “How to Retire in Mexico on
$2.75 a day.” The author, Earl Stanley Gardner, said that the best place to retire in all of Mexico was in Playa La Mision in Baja California. With
that in mind she and her seventeen-year-old daughter Kate, jumped in her car and headed for Baja. She looked in La Mision—no luck—and headed down the
old road to Ensenada. They looked at several places, but nothing tickled their fancy. On their way back they discovered Playa La Salina. Liz said
that a sea of bright yellow flowers underscored the whiteness of the beach and the blue-green of the ocean. This was it! This was what she had been
looking for.
A few months later she got her husband, Doc, to drive down to La Salina. They ended up buying (30 year lease) an ocean front lot for $3000.00. That
was in 1968. 1969 saw them start construction on their dream home. It was built for the princely sum of $4000.00.
The Beatty’s early on became very closely involved with most of the Mexican families in the area and maintained that relationship for over three
decades. Liz always made it a point to visit with each of her Mexican friends every time she returned to La Salina. She did not hesitate to take
young Mexican girls, whom she had seen grow up, aside, and tell them—“to be careful and you are too young to get married.” She cared about her
‘friends’ and it showed. When interacting with the Mexicans, her face would soften and take on a special glow.
Doc Beatty (MD) played a mean piano and he and Joe Connolly, playing the guitar, entertained the patrons of the Cantina whenever they were in camp.
Some of the stories Liz told were difficult to believe, not that they didn’t happen, but that they happened to her. One of these was the time she was
in a restroom of a bar in Ensenada when a Lesbian propositioned her. We’ll not cover any more episodes here. Suffice to say, Liz lead not the
sheltered life a lot of people thought she did.
When I began writing articles for the camp paper, the “Que Pasa” (What’s Happening), it was Liz who suggested the by line of ‘The Dirt Road
Philosopher.’ Most people would say that we were both wrapped up in our Liberal vs. Conservative beliefs—but they would be so terribly wrong. We
loved to explore each other’s beliefs (that’s a neat way of saying arguing).
I sorely miss our quiet conservation’s while she threw balls to her dog Judy on that dusty dirt road.
Whenever Liz was in camp on a Friday night, she made a point of going to the Cantina and having dinner and a few drinks with her old friends. She
always ordered a Mexican combination plate because that ‘was’ the thing to do. She went to visit with her old friends but as the night progressed you
would find her visiting with a ‘new friend or two.’
Listen to Liz describe her “little bit of paradise” that she loved so much. “The wide, white beach ran for three miles with tide pools at each end,
like book ends. The pools at Angel’s point were like aquariums. In camp we found ground squirrels, meadowlarks, bunnies, lizards, and a few snakes.
In the lagoon were Stilts, Mallards, Blue Heron, Phalaropes, and around the house were Humming birds, House Finches, Swallows, Ravens, Starlings, and
a Marsh Hawk who patrolled the swale in front of our casita. On the beach were Least Sandpipers, Willets, Gadwits, Pelicans, and Gulls. The ocean
contained hundreds of Dolphins with whales coming and going from Alaska to Scammons Lagoon.”
Did she love this place? You bet! She hated it when the streetlights came in! She complained that she could no longer see her stars or the
phosphorescent Naito-flagella (her words-not mine) that made lightening like streaks across the tops of the breakers in the moonlight.
Jack died in 1983 and the family moved back to their home in Berkeley, California. After her husband’s death Liz would load up her car and she and
Judy would make the trek from Northern California to La Salina four times each year.
While in camp, she always wore a perky yellow and blue bandana covering her hair. We would see her each evening just before sunset, sitting on her
front porch-drink in hand-waiting to see “the green flash” that she and Doc had seen so many years ago; on their first night in La Salina. When she
saw us she always smiled, lifted her drink, and silently laughed.
Just before her death in June of 1998 she wrote, “Memories of My Casita” which she ended with the following; “Jack is gone and my kids are far away,
but I still have to come down to my casita because it is so beautiful, and it’s mine.”
Liz first came to La Salina during Easter week of 1968. She came back in 1998 to her final resting place; the ocean in front of ‘her casita’.
We think of her often and always when someone mentions the “green flash.”
Goodbye, Friend!
P.S. The Beatty home was the third one built in La Salina del Mar and remained in the family until it was sold in 2005.
Liz always said she would sell her home if Lu and I left. Her daughter, Kate, did exactly that a year after we moved back to the States.
My smidgen of a claim to fame is that I have had so many really good friends. By Bernie Swaim December 2007
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